


five letters snufkin sent before spring

by meradorm



Category: Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:53:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22414312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meradorm/pseuds/meradorm
Summary: While they hibernate, Snufkin sends them letters.Written by request.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 37





	1. Dear Moomintroll,

Dear Moomintroll,

The sun is going down. Sunsets make me think about you lately, you know. While I was walking along the road a week or two ago, I realized I don't know when exactly it is you go to bed for the winter. Do you have your meal of pine needles first thing in the morning, or after dinner? Maybe even late at night - after hot chocolate and a raging fire, some conversation, some long goodbyes? Maybe someday I'll be around long enough to watch over you, though I don't know about that. Maybe if it's a mild autumn. It's better to be on the road early. I don't want to get snowed in. 

The first snow has already set in, although it's warmer down south than it would be otherwise - don't worry, I didn't wake up shivering, or scared. Only cold, pleasantly cold. It's a shame you don't know much about what that feels like. You never liked the cold all that much, so you never paid attention to how good it can feel. But that's fine, isn't it? I have some things that are just for me. Still, I would like to explain all these things to you someday, only with the stipulation that you don't have to understand them.

Do you see how the light touches the snow when you first wake up? Do you want me to show it to you? I'll come back to Moominvalley early this year. If I show you, I know you'll see it. Even if you don't see what I see, you'll see me.

Are you dreaming about me? Will you tell me later? 

With all my love,

Snufkin.


	2. Dear Little My,

Dear Little My,

Why do you hibernate, anyway? Promise me next time you'll stay awake and make as much mischief as possible, and leave it for everyone else to clean up afterwards.

Of course, I'm kidding.

What do you remember about our mother? You were born before I was and she kept you for quite a while, didn't she? Forgive me, but did you ever learn why she got rid of me, exactly? I always thought it was because she couldn't afford to raise more children - low on money, time, or spirit, or possibly all three. Even the Mymble's Daughter was run ragged from the sound of it, I can't imagine how she must have felt by the time I came along.

Well, don't worry about it. By the time you wake up, I'll have forgotten all about it. Don't bring it up if you don't feel like it.

Coming back to Moominvalley early this year. It occurred to me when I turned around that I still have considerable time before you're all up again. I think I'll check on the Mymble. I'll give her your best wishes...whether you want me to or not.

Your half-brother,

Snufkin.


	3. Dear Mother,

Dear Mother (called the Mymble),

Do Mymbles rest in winter? I know Little My does, though maybe she only does it because everyone else in the household does and she doesn't want to be alone. Maybe you do. I imagine you want a break from your children - or maybe you don't, and that's a terribly hurtful thing to say. I should strike out that line, except I thought it, so it's just as well that you know I did.

I'll send the letter anyway. You can read it whenever you get it. (In fact I wrote this thinking there would be a long pause between when I wrote it and when you read it. No taking it back by then.) Hopefully, it'll last out the winter, if it comes to that. If snow gets in the mailbox and the letter gets all wet and the ink runs, I hope you'll tell me so I can write another one. 

I never learned much about you. Only that you had a round body, that you were always laughing. Please, won't you tell me a little bit more about you? Where were you born? Who raised you? What did you love most when you were a child? Did you still love it when you became very grown-up?

I almost struck all that out too.

I'm on my way back to Moominvalley early this year. Moominpappa never told us quite where his colony was, if you should still live near those parts. I tried to take a zig-zag by the sea, figuring I could follow the shore well enough, but no matter how many rivers and lakes I followed, I could never find it. I'm lost now, but don't worry about me. If things get too hard for me I'll ask a mail courier, they know where everything and everyone is. I'll simply wrap myself up in brown parcel-paper and send myself back to Moomintroll.

Send me your address, if you have the time to see me, and I'll come next year. If you don't have the time - only tell me, and I'll be content either way. I decided that just now. 

From your son, most respectfully,

Snufkin.


	4. Dear Father,

Dear Father (called the Joxter),

Frankly, I don't know if you can read. I think you said the Muddler taught you, or tried to teach you, anyway. Could you please ask him to read it to you, if you can't read it yourself? I don't mind him seeing any of this. He's a good person.

I think you must be resting this winter. Moominpappa said you like to sleep. But you also like to wander, like I do - or did he really say that? I have only a few little images of you, and I try to put together the whole of you that way.

And that isn't fair to you, is it?

You wouldn't mind, I don't think. I know, beyond anything else, that you're always yourself. You wouldn't change your mind and decide that some way you acted or something you said wasn't the real you, that it misrepresented you somehow. Whatever glimpse of you I saw, it was a part of a whole.

When we saw each other for the first and only time I asked you so many questions. You barely had any time for your own. Did you want to ask them? I think you did. Well, I want to tell you about myself - to give you a few images of your own. 

I go south every winter. I leave sometime in late autumn, or even late summer, whenever it occurs to me to go. I play the harmonica as I walk, when it occurs to me to play, and quite a few of the animals and spirits around the paths I take know me from the songs I like to sing. I have friends everywhere, but my favorite is Moomintroll, and I always go back to Moominvalley so I can be with him for another half-year.

This year I'm going back early, but I got lost looking for the Mymble. (I hoped for a family visit, you see.) A dray of squirrels found me, and I don't know how they managed - usually their minds are so occupied with remembering where they buried their nuts that they're completely addled about everything else - but they put me back on the right path, towards the valley.

Did you ever find a place like that? A place you wanted to return to? Or do you keep searching? No - I don't think you search at all. Not even for me. 

I'm glad.

Forever your son,

Snufkin. 


	5. Dear myself,

Dear myself,

Don't forget. Whatever happens, don't forget how you woke up in the morning and watched the wind blow the snow up over the icy river, and don't forget how the light glittered on the pine needles, and don't you dare forget how much you love other people.

Don't forget how to come back to Moominvalley. And don't forget how to leave.

Look, the sun is coming up - you can see the Lonely Mountains cresting over the horizon.

Time to go.

Yours,

Snufkin.


End file.
